Co-Sponsored with the University of Georgia’s Catholic Center
and the Central Presbyterian Church of AtlantaLeaders: Ilise Benshushan Cohen & Julie Norman

The United States has been the most dominant international player in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This delegation will examine the historic and current role of U.S. government and civil society intervention in the region. The delegation will meet with Palestinian and Israeli civil society leaders, activists and experts who will discuss the role of U.S. military, humanitarian and diplomatic aid, as well as its legal implications.

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From The Electronic Intifada

Israeli Demolition of Palestinian woman’s home “a double crime”

Budour Youssef Hassan11 February 2015

A massive Israeli police force raided the Palestinian neighborhood of Bayarat Shannir in Lydd, a city in present-day Israel, on Tuesday morning.Armed to the teeth and accompanied by bulldozers, hundreds of police officers stormed the neighborhood and sealed all entrances. At 10am, the police demolished the home of Hana al-Naqib, a mother of four, saying that it was built without a permit. Hana and her children, aged 7, 8, 14 and 15, were violently expelled from their newly-built home, as were the neighbors who came to support them.”

“A true Arab knows how to catch a fly in his hands,”
my father would say. And he’d prove it,
cupping the buzzer instantly
while the host with the swatter stared.

In the spring our palms peeled like snakes.
True Arabs believed watermelon could heal fifty ways.
I changed these to fit the occasion.

Years before, a girl knocked,
wanted to see the Arab.
I said we didn’t have one.
After that, my father told me who he was,
“Shihab”—“shooting star”—
a good name, borrowed from the sky.
Once I said, “When we die, we give it back?”
He said that’s what a true Arab would say.